Cardinal Pell has said sorry over the Catholic Church’s handling of altar boy sexual abuse case

THE cardinal told the royal commission in a dramatic session today that his closest advisers had given incorrect information to the inquiry.

Janet Fife-Yeomans

DailyTelegraphMarch 25, 201412:48pm

John Davoren, pictured, was wrong in his evidence, according to George Pell.Source:News Corp Australia

WRONG, wrong wrong.

Cardinal Pell has said his closest advisers were wrong in the evidence they have given to the royal commission about his involvement and knowledge of the controversial case of former altar boy John Ellis.

On eight occasions when they have given signifiant evidence, they were wrong, Cardinal Pell said.

Even his personal secretary, Dr Michael Casey, who had worked with him in Melbourne before moving with him to Sydney in 2001 when Cardinal Pell was appointed archbishop and only left the job last week, was wrong.

“He would know your arrangements very well, would he not cardinal?” said counsel assisting the royal commission Gail Furness SC.

Cardinal Pell: “Not - he is completely honest and completely reliable but he’s not the archbishop and he knows what he knows and there are some things he didn’t know.”

John Davoren, pictured, was wrong in his evidence, according to George Pell.Source:News Corp Australia

He said that John Davoren, who had been the inaugural director of the church’s NSW professional standards office was wrong in his evidence that in every case, it was the archbishop who decided whether a victim of sex abuse should receive compensation.

Mr Casey was wrong when he said that money matters relating to amounts of compensation under the church’s Towards Healing process would be discussed with the archbishop and also wrong that the archbishop would have sought out information about matters of reparation.

He was also wrong when he said that all claims of child sex abuse made against church personnel would have been discussed with him.

“I’m not a micro-manager,” the cardinal said.

The former chancellor of the Sydney diocese, Monsignor Brian Rayner, was not only wrong in his evidence that he discussed the offers of $25,000 and $30,000 made to Mr Ellis to settle his claim, Cardinal Pell said he found some of it “grotesque.”

The cardinal said it was “grotesque” to suggest he would have authorised just another $5000 after hearing that Mr Ellis had lost his job at a major law firm because of the ongoing effects of his sex abuse by a priest as a teenager.

Ms Furness said that the current director of professional standards, Michael Salmon, had given evidence that the cardinal would have known that Mr Ellis had been willing to settle his claim for $100,000.

Cardinal Pell said that while he endorsed the main legal strategies in the fight against against Mr Ellis, he was not involved in the day to day running of the case.

“After recently having correspondence and the transcripts of the hearing drawn to my attention, I realise I should have exercised more regular and stringent oversight of my chancellors,” he said.

In his first appearance in the witness box at the royal commission into institutional responses to child sex abuse, Cardinal Pell said he was now “troubled” that the Sydney diocese, of which he was archbishop, had disputed in court that Mr Ellis had been abused.

The commission has been told that a church report had already concluded that Mr Ellis was telling the truth but he was questioned for four days in the witness box.

Abused by Father Aiden Duggan (sometimes known as Aiden): former altar boy John Ellis. PiSource:News Corp Australia

The church’s lawyers and members of Cardinal Pell’s inner circle have given evidence that he was directing the vigorous defence of Mr Ellis’ claim. The cardinal is yet to be quizzed on this in the witness box.

“I acknowledge and apologise to Mr Ellis for the gross violation and abuse committed by Aidan Duggan, a deceased priest of the Sydney Diocese,” Cardinal Pell said in a statement.

“Mistakes were made by me and by others in the church that resulted in driving Mr Ellis and the archdiocese apart rather than bringing healing. I acknowledge and regret those mistakes.

“Also certain steps were taken in he litigation that now cause me concern and that I would not repeat. Lessons have been learned.”

He said that despite the court ruling in Mr Ellis’ case that the church was not a legal entity and could not be sued, he believed the church in Australis should be able to be sued in cases of sexual abuse.

Not one case had ever succeeded in any court in Australia.

Cardinal Pell has said that “a number of cases, for example schools, the incidents (of child sexual abuse) are found not to be validated.”

There was applause from the public gallery when counsel assisting the commission, Gail Furness SC, called for the Catholic Education office to provide that data.

Church sex-abuse victims compared with Nazis

EARLIER, Cardinal Pell told the inquiry that victims of child sex abuse were once viewed as enemies of the Catholic Church, much like the Nazis and the communists, Cardinal George Pell said today.

He said that in the mid-1990s, the Vatican’s attitude towards what he called the “scandal, the crimes” was inadequate.

In Australia, a committee had been set up in 1988 to look at child sex abuse. It was called a “special issues committee”.

“Sexual abuse is an ugly term and this was a euphemism,” Cardinal Pell.

In his first appearance before the royal commission into institutional responses to child sex abuse, he began by saying that a written statement he had earlier made to the commission was true and correct - except in one or two places which he said he would “develop” because they were incomplete.

They involved the amounts of money which were offered by the Sydney diocese to former altar boy John Ellis during the Towards Healing process, he told the commission.

Mr Ellis went on to sue the church but lost his case after the church fought not only the fact that he had been sexually abused but that they were not a legal entity and therefore could not be sued.

In his statement, Cardinal Pell said he did not know that Mr Ellis had agreed to settle his case for $100,000 before the church ran up costs of $1.5 million fighting him.

Other witnesses who were in Cardinal Pell’s inner circle have told the commission that the cardinal knew about the $100,000 and had directed the Sydney diocese to offer Mr Ellis $25,000 and then $30,000, which Mr Ellis refused.

He said that the Vatican even in the mid-90s believed that the accusations of child sex abuse were made exclusively or predominantly by enemies of the Catholic Church.

This changed when a deputation of American bishops visited the Vatican.

“They explained that it was not the enemies of the church who were doing this as the Nazis and possibly the communists had done but they were genuine complaints and good people, people who loved the church were saying it’s not being dealt with well enough,” Cardinal Pell said.

He continues to give his evidence ahead of his farewell ceremony tomorrow when he officially leaves the Sydney Diocese.